Walking Dead is only the number three indie book this month, as IDW’s My Little Pony, and Dynamite’s Masks take the top two spots on their first issues. Saga, Spawn & Adve

nture Time all see good jumps, and there are decent launches for Judge Dredd, Shadowman and Clone. Elsewhere it’s relatively quiet. There are a clutch of new books launching, notably Great Pacific, which is getting great write-ups, and the final series of Locke & Key, hitting new heights.

151 indie books charted this month, up on last month’s 135. The bottom book sold 4,341, down on last month’s 5,161. They sold approximately 1,615,140 in total, up on last month’s 1,405,112. Average sales are 10,696 per book, up on last month’s 10,408. UK and European sales from Diamond UK are not reported in this chart.

It was a poor month for risers. Out of the 151 books, only 16 went up in sales (compared to 35 last month), and 114 went down, with the rest made up of one-shots and debuts.

Image claimed top indie publisher again this month, with 7.70% dollar share and a 6.67% market share, IDW have a 5.6% dollar share and 5.07% market share, Dark Horse have a 4.72% dollar share and a 3.75% market share, Dynamite have a 3.71% dollar share and 3.33% market share and Boom! Have a 1.90% dollar share and 1.81% market share, all up apart f

rom Image.

Thanks to icv2.com and Milton Griepp for permission to use these numbers, which are estimates, and can be found here.

Unsurprisingly the new Walking Dead collection sells more than the next five entries put together, with a further four Walking Dead books in this chart. The first Adventure Time collection sells very well, followed by the last Boys collection. The second volumes of Scott Pilgrim Color and Tower Chronicles also make the top 20, alongside the second month for Saga’s debut. Other than that, Dark Horse get four of their perennials appearing and the Manga triple-threat of Sailor Moon, Naruto and Bleach take another four places, with an Image reprint of Scene of the Crime and the second Rachel Rising collection rounding out the chart.

Unfortunately for Dark Horse the publicity machine for the upcoming Ryan Reynolds/ Jeff Bridges film, that this mini prequels, hasn’t kicked into gear yet. Ergo very low sales. No doubt the collection will be coming out in time for the movie, and is obviously the focus. The film is based on an old Dark Horse series.

The drops speed up, as the book goes on hiatus for a few months. That may not be the best move, as gaps in the schedule can sometimes hurt sales, but they may be hoping that the first trade collection does well enough to pull in some new readers.

The drops are speeding up again. That annoys me, as I’m really enjoying the book, but it may be that the convoluted storylines that worked well with the likes of Guardians of the Galaxy and the Legion are a bit more difficult to follow with a bunch of completely new characters.

Garth Ennis’ war series returns for a third round. These books should sell better, there are an awful lot of Ennis fans who are obviously not reading these, more fool them. It’s one of the best series he writes.

Heavily delayed, but not surprising considering that this is the most detailed book Wrightson has illustrated in years. It’s been quite remarkable; I hope there’s an oversized edition coming (or an Artists Edition).

Three of Valiant’s new books clustered around the same sales mark, and all have taken a small tumble this month. Even so, they’re still doing very well, and Bloodshot & Harbinger are about to cross-over.

I think the best-selling issue ever, as the critically acclaimed series returns for its climax (Hill talked about an epilogue series of one-shots, but I’m not sure if that’s still happening.). It really is far better than these sales would suggest, I think it’ll go on to be regarded as a bit of a classic.

That’s a pretty good drop off, considering this is an unknown quantity sales-wise, and Riley Rossomo’s last book didn’t quite light up the sales chart. The first issue gains another 4,567 in a second print.

Another big increase for the fan favourite, which is now selling almost double the numbers it launched with. Boom have done very well in hiring Ryan North, the man behind popular online strip Dinosaur Comics, to write the book, as he seems to be capturing the spirit of the cartoon brilliantly.

A huge jump, mainly down to variant covers to tie in with the US election, one with Romney Wins! and one with Obama Wins!. It spoofs the first Watchmen cover too, which probably didn’t hurt.

69. Judge Dredd (IDW)
11/2012: Judge Dredd #1 - 32,266

An excellent launch, tie-ing in with the movie, which sadly bombed in the US. It’s a strong title, very much closer to the UK stories than the misguided DC version which accompanied the Stallone movie. Whether it’ll keep enough of this audience ongoing remains to be seen.

Now this is interesting. Image recently announced that they wouldn’t be reprinting books, to encourage retailers to increase their initial orders. This backfired hugely, retailers were very upset, and the decision was reversed. Now this was the issue that sparked Image’s decision, but sales have significantly increased, meaning that retailers had increased their orders, yet still sold out. This seems to make Image’s initial announcement even more ill-conceived.
Regardless, these are fantastic sales, and I think sales will increase further.

Just the one cover this month, and a drop of almost 17,000 copies, but this is still the third best selling issue yet. I predict roughly the same next month, and then a big jump back up with #106, Charlie Adlard’s 100th issue, which will have two covers.

25. Masks (Dynamite)
11/2012: Masks #1 - 63,932

A spectacular debut, almost 20,000 copies higher than The Shadow launched. This is no doubt aided by Alex Ross on interior art, and possibly the best incentive yet offered. Ross & Jae Lee painted 80 blank covers with watercolors, quite beautiful and detailed in Ross’s case, black and white but no less lovely from Lee. I think you had to order somewhere around 500 copies to get a Ross cover, plus a bunch of other variants and a store-specific logo. For 750, you got a Lee cover as well. I make that at least 33,750 copies there alone.

15. My Little Pony (IDW)
11/2012: - My Little Pony #1 - 80,128

As I predicted a couple of months ago, My Little Pony canters to the top of the indie charts, although with slightly lower sales than expected. Second & third printings have followed, and they seem to have been well-received, so it’ll be interesting to see how long it can keep these sorts of sales. IDW must be delighted anyway.

======

All figures on this chart are estimates for comics sold by Diamond to direct market retailers. They include reorders that shipped in the same month. Books shipping in the first week of a month will have more time for reorders to appear than ones shipping in the last week of the month, when reorders will slip to the following month.

Related

Comments

1. Some of those longer titles are getting cut off, but that could be just my browser
2. I have a feeling that Masks number will drop sharply. I supplement my monthly books with trades & shirts through DCBS. My order last month had a free DCBS Variant of Masks which I did not order. I wonder if this number includes these freebies.

I feel like we need to manufacture some sort of outrage in the comments so this chart gets the same attention as the DC one does.

I love the reverse format! Most of my favorite books are at the top now. I really enjoy It Girl and the Atomics, but I could probably move into Allred’s world and feel right at home. It’s pretty quirky and an Allred book with Allred is a hard enough sell as it is, so I understand the sales. I love Popeye! Landridge never, ever disappoints. But don’t see that book lasting long. Outdated character plus Landridge only writing makes it a hard sale, too.

Mind MGT is the freaking book right now. Kindt has been awesome for a while, but he’s really bringing it in this one. I’m really happy it’s slowly catching on. Prophet’s reliably solid sci-fi that’s just off the charts imaginative. Manhattan Projects is a lot of fun, too. Both are hard sci-fi and will always have trouble finding traction.

My favorite book is finally catching on – Adventure Time! There’s so much to love in every issue of that book. Every page is just full of cool little things. Bravest Warriors is unbelievably under ordered. It’s practically impossible to find. I’ve given up and I’m just waiting for the trade now.

Dashbender – that’s the weird thing, issue 100 was last month, and sales dropped. Then went back up for #101. In the middle of a storyline. Just no idea why. Oh, unless that was the issue with a variant, DH are doing a themed series at the moment, so it may have been this issue. Anyone?

Why is Dynamite publishing Witchblade Demon Reborn?
It’s great to see Planetoid increase as I really like the book and was worried at its previous sales level that it might not last. I bought the first issues of Great Pacific and Nowhere Men because they looked interesting and they were alright but I was wondering if anybody here had read the subsequent issues and what their thoughts were on them. Also, I knew the My Little Pony book did well but what created the demand? I didn’t know they were even still around.
Thanks! I love how well Indie books in general are doing and it’s impressive you putting this chart every month with knowledge on all the varied titles!

The 2 monthly Transformers titles are at the same lows of the previous ongoing now until it dipped to a low of 9,500. Who will they get to write the next reluanch? Another Marvel alum/current Valiant hire like the GI Joe reboot? Duane Swierczynski?

Love Great Pacific. Only got through the first two issues but it has been a great read. I also like the new column format. yours is the column I yours is the column I enjoy the most currently out of the sales charts .

Hahaha, excellent! But Mellerick’s dripping sarcasm is partly why I enjoy this column, though I will admit his rants about The Simpsons comics destroying the purity of the tv show do tend to ramble. And I’d like to read my Mars Attacks sales info WITHOUT the bitterness. I have no idea why he goes off on sarcastic tangents about the larger companies stifling the publishing rights of non-planets like Pluto. ‘Pluto Attacks’ just doesn’t sound very menacing. Get over it, dude.

The Spider is a really gorgeous title with really stiff, cliche (and slightly bad) writing. I have no clue why, he did an excellent job with Marvel’s Mystery Men mini. I finally had to drop it, simpy because of the writing.

PeterCSm730 & Nick Jones – I love you guys, thanks :D Peter, I’m really enjoying both Great Pacific and Nowhere Men, GP in particular has potential to be a future classic.

Srfan – it’s a bit of an ongoing issue, indie titles tend to be awfully long, and I’ve condensed them as far as possible without turning them into gibberish. I’m not sure if maybe decreasing the size of your screen font might help short-term. Heidi is working on it anyway.

Oops, I’ve just noticed this month’s major gaffe. #238 should have been Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Color Classics, which sold 6,471 copies. I accidentally posted the main title’s sales instead, and then repeated them later down the chart where it should have been. I blame Christmas.

Mellerick, I’m on a budget and you do me harm with you recommendations! I’ll get them my next visit. I picked up Multiple Warheads too because of the art. I haven’t finished it so not sure about story but it I certainly appreciate the art.

The last to first format fits in pretty nice here for independents. I hope you keep it. And it doesn’t seem disrespectful as the DC gangsters might take it. They are still getting over that pesky Twitter thing, making humiliating freelancers unlike the good old days for them.

I commented over the Image interview on that the low proportion of fresh in the door, unestablished talent on Images roster and there was a debate about that. Looks like from what I saw on the April 2013 previews on another blog is that there is going to be more of the same stale type stuff from the industry regulars- futuristic cities gone wrong, dystopia, throw-away heroes in disfunctional scenarios, Alan Moore wannabe tales , So maybe you should make that 4-5k book list longer to 400 or so. This approach is not going to bring new readers at all and surely bores the big two default collectors who’ll just pass these by. Image may have a respectful year but they’ll be wiped out by digital independents within 2-3 yrs at this pace. They are not going to bring in many new readers with this sleepy stuff even if they have nudity and lots of swearing. Saga is a terrific exception (but one book) and Walking Dead being the phenomenon it is (though I don’t read it) will keep them around. But I think they are missing their moment. Nobody wants Penguin Books with sci-fi pictures,

Can’t anybody make a good superhero or even a manga type story anymore on par with Marvel or DC classics that doesn’t star a drunk or psychotic ? Just a bummer. ..This stuff is a lot like Epic Comics way back when, sort of middle ground, mediocre sci-fi .My only hope is that independent digital publishing saves the day this year with the rise of tablets. And maybe gets this type of coverage so we can find them.

I pick up 4 out of the 5 Valiant titles and I really enjoy them. I wish their numbers were better. I dropped It-Girl because I just couldn’t get into it despite the great artwork. Also, too bad the new Perhapanauts mini didn’t chart, it’s alot of fun. I’m interested to see where the Brian Wood Star Wars lands on the charts.

James T and me are kindred spirits, haha. I don’t follow Star Wars but I know the most recent one (I think it featured to old school characters) completely sold out in the blink of an eye at my local shop. Is that the one written by Brian Wood?

Quick thought about issue #7 of Saga jumping up in sales- isn’t it the first issue not collected in the first trade? I think the trade has sold well, so I can see some people coming on board the monthly issues to keep up with the story…